While most people don't think of Macs for gaming purposes, it was during Steve Jobs' keynote speech at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference that John Carmack, co-founder and technical director of id Software, decided to unveil their never-before-seen next-gen game engine.

id Tech 5 was shown to the public running on a Mac, in real time. It also supports the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 consoles, as well as PC - and hopes to follow in the footsteps of previous id technology, which has powered best-selling games worldwide (Quake, Doom, Wolfenstein 3-D) and cemented the company's status as the "premier technology provider" for the industry.

Carmack explains,

"Since many developers at id have made the switch to the Mac for their personal use, we decided it was now time to bring our core game technology to OS X. After a rapid bring up of the codebase, we were delighted to find that the latest Macs are the fastest systems in our offices for some of the time consuming processing jobs and will be contributing to our development process in many useful ways."

id Tech 5 virtually eliminates any constraints with regard to texture memory, allowing artists and designers almost unlimited visual fidelity, practically giving them free rein in designing and uniquely customising the entire game world - at the pixel level. There's also a powerful new suite of tools designed to accelerate the content creation process - so games in the future will contain vast, sweeping outdoor landscapes completely unique even to the horizon, while still having indoor sets featuring unprecedented artistic detail.

The new engine will be available for licensing to developers and publishers who want a "truly next-generation rendering and game development solution"... so, budding game creators, better start saving your pennies. This kind of technology won't come cheap.